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Monday, December 10, 2012

I realize I haven't blogged in a while, so I sit here staring at my laptop screen and try to come up with something that wouldn't just be a repeat of the previous posts.

It's hard. It gets harder every day. As Babe grows it gets tougher and tougher to write about anything else but you.

Yes, you. The world. The people in it.

You, and not my daughter, are the reason for this blog. As Babe gets older and develops and becomes her own little person (with a not-so-little or contained person's personality) my mind revolves less and less around Down syndrome. I see her as different, yes, but I see everyone as different, and regardless of how other parents feel I don't see her as any 'more different' than others. I just don't see it. I don't. Honest.

I see her daddy's chin and easy smile on her, I see my own impatience in her demands, I see her musicality, her freakish sense of rhythm, her first encounter with the christmas tree, her empathy for crying babies, her excitement at the piano, her slightly broken crawl, her smiles and screams, her quirks and her new pink glasses. Just her.

And then someone reminds me that she has Down syndrome. Instead of the usual 'how cute' we get the 'my cousin has Ds so I have a special place in my heart for kids with Ds (I'm making this more correct instead of quoting accurately, but I just can't bring myself to not use people first language). Someone names their cat 'Tard'. Someone uses the words 'retarded', 'mentally deficient', 'mentally challenged' or something of the sort as an insult, to signify something that is slow, broken, or of lesser value, and I find myself acutely reminded that I need to remember that Babe has Down syndrome.

Because if I don't, and I forget to teach her how to tell the world, diplomatically and not, to fuck off and let her be her own person, some of the world might just sneak up on her and make her sad, or worse yet, not give her a chance at living her life the way she wants to.

I'd never be able to forgive myself.

My biggest worry for the future is not whether my kid will learn to walk, talk, drive a car, or find love, it's whether the world, you, will give her a chance to try. Instead of seeing her as a representative of 'those with Down syndrome'.

Her farts smell like goat's milk and salami, you know.

If you steal my photos, creepy Brazilian, I won't post any more of Babe.

About Me

A child of a global world, originally from the land of Santa and cell phones, married to a bona fide viking, and attempting to raise a loud little life who has Down syndrome, all the while getting used to the US Pacific Northwest after many years in Latin America and Africa. Against all odds the kid's first words turned out to be 'mom' and 'book' instead of 'fuck' and 'no'. That may well turn out to have been my finest parenting moment ever.